Political Quotes

“Let me respond very briefly to my friend from Oklahoma and his comments about the FDA bill not having seen the light of day. The amendment that is in front of us is the DeWine-Kennedy bill, which is now an amendment. The DeWine-Kennedy bill was actually introduced in May of this year. It is the only FDA regulation of tobacco bill that was introduced, so it has been out here for people to look at for a long time. It was the product of lengthy negotiations between health groups and others. We went back and forth for a long time. It is not really dissimilar to other bills that have been talked about before in other negotiations. It has evolved over a long period of time. It is the work product of Senator Kennedy and myself, but it is the second generation or third generation of what others have done. So the concepts in this bill are not fundamentally new.”